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Can exercise induce headache?

If you experience a shooting pain soon after exercising, it's time to check

Exercise gives some people a headache. And an exercise-induced headache does not necessarily mean you have migraine. People without migraine are just as likely to develop headache on exertion as those with it.

Effort migraine and exertion-induced headache are the two most common causes of headache after exercise. The former is usually preceded by symptoms like blurred vision and flashing lights. The headache usually lasts for a few hours. Exercising in hot weather can induce a headache in migraine sufferers. Exercise-induced headache was first described in the 1930s. The headache begins as a throbbing sensation in the back of the head and lasts for a few hours.

Not all exercise-linked headaches are benign. Some are deadly serious. If your headache lasts for more than a few hours, if its onset feels like a thunderclap, and if nausea or vomiting too occurs, the headache is unlikely to be benign.

A headache that increases over several days, a history of head injury, unilateral headache, a change in the usual pattern of headache in effort migraine or exertion-induced headache, symptoms in the rest of the body and weakness in the limbs are all indicators that the headache may have a serious underlying cause. Consult a doctor if you experience any of these problems.

RAJIV . M

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